Go time: FGCU, FSU ready for NCAA Tournament clash

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) Don’t expect a lot of great defense when Florida State and FGCU play Thursday night.

Still, the game, set for 9:20 p.m. at Amway Center, has a chance to be one of the most explosive matchups of the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

Both teams like to get up and down and they fly to the basket. Florida State (25-8), the No. 3 seed in the West Region, has done it all season against a much more impressive slate of opponents in the ACC.

But FGCU (26-7), the 14th seed, is capable of stunning some of the power programs, as the Eagles made readily apparent when they made it to the Sweet 16 as a No. 15 seed in 2013.

Battle-tested

The Seminoles are one of the tallest teams in the country, averaging 6-foot-6 per player.

They had the toughest six-game stretch of any team in the nation when they faced ranked opponents in six straight games from Dec. 31 through Jan. 21. They went 5-1 during that span with wins over No. 11 Virginia, No. 21 Virginia Tech, No. 7 Duke, No. 15 Notre Dame and No. 21 Louisville.

Their lone loss came against No.11 North Carolina (96-83) in Chapel Hill, North Carolina on Jan. 14.

But Florida State has gone 7-6 since winning 14 of 15 in the middle of the season. Standout Dwayne Bacon is ready to put the team’s past performance behind it.

“I feel like now it’s a new season,” Bacon said. “There’s a lot of teams that we haven’t played. All they have is the film. They haven’t really played against us, and how our tempo is and what we can do. They haven’t really seen us in person.”

Dunk City

It’s no secret the Eagles like to attack the basket. They have a reputation for dominating the paint and dunking the basketball. The Eagles have 157 dunks this season, which exceeds their previous season high of 148 set during the 2012-13 season.

Coach Leonard Hamilton seemed to take exception to a question about FGCU having a “mystique” about them.

“There’s nothing mysterious about them at all,” Hamilton said. “They’re a good basketball team. They have proven that they deserve a similar respect. … Sure, I’ve heard one or two guys make statements on the television predicting upsets for all over the country. That’s kind of what they do. You’re on TV, you got to make yourself interesting. You say things sometimes that maybe you just want to create the conversation we’re having here by making certain statements.

“It doesn’t really matter. When the ball is thrown up, then that’s when you figure out what you’re capable of doing. That’s really the only thing we’re concerned with. … We’re not going to allow ourselves to get caught up in all the other conversations.”